COLLECTIVE MADNESS


“Soft despotism is a term coined by Alexis de Tocqueville describing the state into which a country overrun by "a network of small complicated rules" might degrade. Soft despotism is different from despotism (also called 'hard despotism') in the sense that it is not obvious to the people."

Sunday, December 22, 2013

Beirut Lebanon: The Sunni-Shia Divide according to Robert Fisk

60 comments:

  1. Shits verse the Suns..

    2 gangs that will fight to the death...

    ReplyDelete
  2. Mahdi Darius NazemroayaSun Dec 22, 08:39:00 PM EST

    A Christian exodus is being planned for the Middle East by Washington, Tel Aviv, and Brussels.

    It has been reported that Sheikh Al-Rahi was told in Paris by then President Nicolas Sarkozy that the Christian communities of the Levant and Middle East can resettle in the European Union.

    This is no gracious offer.

    It is a slap in the face by the same powers that have deliberately created the conditions to eradicate the ancient Christian communities of the Middle East.

    The aim appears to be either the resettling of the Christian communities outside of the region or demarcate them into enclaves. Both could be objectives.

    This project is meant to delineate the Arab nations along the lines of being exclusively Muslim nations and falls into accordance with both the Yinon Plan and the geo-political objectives of the U.S. to control Eurasia.

    A major war may be its outcome. Arab Christians now have a lot in common with black-skinned Arabs.

    http://www.globalresearch.ca/preparing-the-chessboard-for-the-clash-of-civilizations-divide-conquer-and-rule-the-new-middle-east

    ReplyDelete
  3. Jerusalem is the Capital of Israel.

    AND the freest, safest Christians in the middle east live in Israel and are not going anywhere.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies

    1. “Those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities.”

      Delete
    2. “Those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities.”


      You mean like the arab world needs to control ALL of the middle east? Is that why they commit atrocities? 120,000 syrians dead in 2 years... 4.5 million homeless...

      Delete
    3. William ShakespeareSun Dec 22, 10:20:00 PM EST


      “O, beware, my lord, of jealousy;
      It is the green-ey'd monster, which doth mock
      The meat it feeds on.”

      Delete
    4. William ShakespeareSun Dec 22, 10:20:00 PM EST

      “O, beware, my lord, of jealousy;
      It is the green-ey'd monster, which doth mock
      The meat it feeds on.”


      Of course Bill was referring to Islam.

      Delete

    5. “A presumption becomes a self-refuting assertion".

      ― R. Alan Woods, The Journey Is The Destination: A Photo Journal

      Delete
    6. Dont presume it..

      Israel is...

      Choke on it.

      Delete
    7. Voltaire, according to "expert" opinion, was a fifth columnist.

      It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revere.

      Delete
  4. Thank Allah for the Shiite-Sunni divide.

    We should learn better to exploit it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Stephen R. ProtheroSun Dec 22, 09:52:00 PM EST


      “Widespread criticisms of jihad in Islam and the so-called sword verses in the Quran
      have unearthed for fair-minded Christians difficult questions about Christianity's own traditions
      of holy war and 'texts of terror.'

      Like Hinduism's Mahabharata epic, the Bible devotes entire books to war and rumors thereof.
      Unlike the Quran, however, it contains hardly any rules for how to conduct a just war.”

      ― Stephen R. Prothero,
      God Is Not One:
      The Eight Rival Religions That Run the World--and Why Their Differences Matter

      Delete
  5. Claire Davis, Colorado high school shooting victim, dies in hospital

    LITTLETON, Colo. -- A suburban Denver high school student who was shot in the head by a classmate died Saturday afternoon, hospital officials said in a statement.

    Claire Davis, 17, was in critical condition after being shot at point-blank range at Arapahoe High School on Dec. 13. Friends and well-wishers had posted prayers online and raised money to help pay for her medical care.

    "It is with heavy hearts that we share that at 4:29 p.m. this afternoon, Claire Davis passed away, with her family at her side," the statement from Littleton Adventist Hospital.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. "Pierson, whose parents were divorced, lived at least part of the time with his mother in a higher-end neighborhood in suburban Highlands Ranch."

      Nice Job, folks.

      Delete
  6. Deuce,

    ...interesting interview...

    Christians to Lebanon, Alawites to hell

    The fanatics seem to know their history and geography, other than hell of course. Lebanon was established as Christian country at the insistence of the French. That Christians should be in Lebanon, therefore, makes perfect sense to the fanatics. However, the Christian country of Lebanon has been under Islamic pressure from its inception. Therefore, I am not as sanguine about the territorial integrity of Lebanon as he. At some point not too far down the road, his observation will be tested. If it is to be a sanctuary, it will take stern international military pressure. It also means that Hezbollah will have to go.

    Mr. Fisk's remark about terrorism coming to the region because of Bush and Blair is rubbish. He also seemed to have some difficulty defining terrorism other than in terms of Bush-Blair. As he well knows, terrorism has been rampant in the region for decades. He also knows that terrorism can be defined according to UN standards. Hence, on this issue I found him gratuitously disingenuous.

    As to Syria, I agree with him as to no foreseeable conclusion to the conflict. Unlike him, I do not think Syria will retain its present form. Turkey is all in against Assad and Iran is uncomfortably snared protecting Assad. Saudi Arabia will eventually prevail.

    Turkey is creating a monster in northern Syria with its support of the fanatics. Since it can never trust them to become domesticated, I am curious, wishing to get a sense of its plan for disbanding an army of Quran thumping killers. To take them into Turkey would be dangerously destabilizing. To leave them in place creates much the same problem.


    ReplyDelete
    Replies

    1. So it is the human condition that to wish for the greatness
      of one's fatherland is to wish evil to one's neighbors.

      Delete
    2. When one's neighbors occupy 899/900th of the middle east and butcher all those that do not share their faith?

      It's called fascism...

      Delete
    3. No, it is not.

      “The definition of fascism is the marriage of corporation and state ”
      ― Benito Mussolini


      Think before you speak.
      Read before you think.



      Delete
    4. aint he the guy they dragged thru the streets after they hung him and his girl friend?

      yep..

      islam is fascism....

      AND israel grows stronger each hour, choke on it.

      Delete


    5. “But indifference would ultimately commend itself as a devastating weapon.”


      ― Lionel Shriver, We Need to Talk About Kevin

      Delete
    6. In your ignorance you speak volumes.

      Mussolini invented fascism,
      the Arabs and Muslims may be many things, but fascists in't one of 'em.


      An important factor in fascism gaining support in its earliest stages was the fact that it claimed to oppose discrimination based on social class and was strongly opposed to all forms of class war.

      Fascism instead supported nationalist sentiments such as a strong unity,
      regardless of class, in the hopes of raising Italy up to the levels of its great Roman past.


      The ideological basis for fascism came from a number of sources.

      Mussolini utilized works of Plato, Georges Sorel, Nietzsche,
      and the socialist and economic ideas of Vilfredo Pareto, to create fascism.


      Mussolini admired The Republic, which he often read for inspiration.




      bob

      Delete
    7. Syrian aircraft pummeled an opposition neighborhood in the northern city of Aleppo on Sunday, killing at least 32 people and extending the government's furious aerial bombardment of the rebel-held half of the divided city to an eighth consecutive day.

      Since it began on December 15, the government's unusually heavy air campaign in Aleppo has killed more than 200 people, smashed residential buildings and overwhelmed the city's hospitals with casualties. The timing of the assault — a month ahead of planned peace talks in Switzerland — suggests that Syrian President Bashar Assad could be trying to strengthen his position and expose the opposition's weaknesses before sitting down at the negotiating table.

      Sunday's air raids targeted Aleppo's Masaken Hanano neighborhood, hitting a second-hand market, a two-story building and a main road, activists said.

      The Aleppo Media Center activist group said at least 32 people were killed, and published a list of the names of the dead on its Facebook page. Another group, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said in a later statement that at least 44 people were killed and dozens wounded.


      Now that's reality... Not the bullshit you post hour after hour...

      Israel grows stronger each hour...

      Choke on it.

      Delete
    8. The basic underlying idea behind Mussolini's foreign policy was that of spazio vitale (vital space),
      a concept in Fascism that was analogous to lebensraum in German National Socialism.

      The concept of spazio vitale was first announced in 1919, when the entire Mediterranean, especially so-called Julian March was redefined to make it appear a unified region that had belonged to Italy from the times of the ancient Roman province of Italia,
      was claimed as Italy's exclusive sphere of influence.

      The right to colonize the neighboring Slovene ethnic areas and Mediterranean,
      being inhabited by what were alleged to be less developed peoples,
      was justified on the grounds that Italy was suffering from overpopulation.


      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benito_Mussolini#Creation_of_Fascism


      bob

      Delete

    9. We know that both the Israeli and the NAZI embrace the concept of Lebensraum ("living space") as being a law of nature for all healthy and vigorous peoples of superior races …



      bob

      Delete

    10. As did the Italian Fascists ...

      Does that make the secular state of Israel a fascist and socialist state?


      bob

      Delete

    11. That is the fantastic thing about the National Socialists,...
      that they simultaneously share in a community of ideas with Soviet Russia and with Zion.”


      ― Victor Klemperer, I Will Bear Witness: A Diary of the Nazi Years, 1933-1941

      Delete
    12. Israel sits on 1/900th of the middle east.

      Of which 20% are arab citizens.

      Now the arab occupying middle east? 899/900th. Having ethnically cleansed the 899/900th of Jews, they now set their sites on cleansing the blacks and the christians from those lands as well.

      Thanks for bringing up the idea "superior" races. The arabs? supported hitler and subscribed to the idea of being a superior race.

      I suggest you look at what they call a MAP....

      I doubt you will find one in that box of cracker jacks you are eating from...

      Delete
    13. Anne Elisabeth StenglSun Dec 22, 11:23:00 PM EST


      “I could try to care, but I ain't sure it's worth the bother.”

      ― Anne Elisabeth Stengl, Veiled Rose

      Delete
    14. And yet you post hundreds and hundreds of meaningless posts...

      Your actions speak louder that then the crap you post..

      israel IS....

      choke on it.

      Delete
  7. “Both La Raza and the Palestinians have been displaced by invaders
    that have utilized military means to conquer and occupy our territories.”


    But the threat of secession is not merely from groups that might be considered on the fringe,
    Spencer insists, noting the declarations of Mexican leaders, up to the highest office.

    Former Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo said in a 1997 speech in Chicago to the “National Council of La Raza", a Hispanic advocacy group, that he

    “proudly affirmed that the Mexican nation extends beyond the territory enclosed by its borders and that Mexican migrants are an important – a very important – part of this.”

    A Zogby poll reported that 58% of Mexicans believe that the southwestern US belongs to Mexico.[16]Harvard University professor Samuel P. Huntington stated in 2004 that:

    “Demographically, socially and culturally,
    the reconquista of the Southwest United States by Mexico is well under way.

    No other immigrant group in U.S. history has asserted or could assert a historical claim to U.S. territory. Mexicans and Mexican-Americans can and do make that claim.


    Reconquista sentiments are often jocularly referred to by media targeted to Mexicans, including a recent Absolut Vodka ad that generated significant controversy in the United States for its printing of a map of pre-Mexican-American war Mexico.





    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Jews have a home in Israel. No matter whether some insane, clown posse approves or disapproves.

      The good news? Every day Israel grows stronger....

      :)

      Choke on it...

      Delete
    2. There is no such thing as a palestinian.

      Israel is.....

      Choke on it.

      Delete

    3. “The world is very lovely, and it's very horrible-
      -and it doesn't care about your life or mine or anything else.”

      ― Rudyard Kipling, The Light That Failed

      Delete
    4. I agree about the world not caring about you...

      But Israel IS....

      Choke on it.

      Delete
  8. Replies
    1. Former Mossad Director Ephraim Halevy not only has publicly opposed an Israeli attack on Iran as anything but a last resort;
      he is a longstanding supporter of a diplomatic solution to the Iran nuclear issue.
      In September of 2012, Halevy told Haaretz‘s Ari Shavit that Israel needed to understand the Iranian perspective:

      The basic feeling of that ancient nation is one of humiliation.
      Both religious Iranians and secular Iranians feel that for 200 years the Western powers used them as their playthings.

      They do not forget for a moment that the British and the Americans intervened in their internal affairs and toppled the regime of Mohammad Mosaddeq in 1953.

      From their perspective, the reason why, to this day, there is no modern rail network and no modern oil refineries in Iran is that the West prevented that.

      Thus, the deep motive behind the Iranian nuclear project
      − which was launched by the Shah −
      is not the confrontation with Israel,
      but the desire to restore to Iran the greatness of which it was long deprived.

      I believe that if the West could find a way to propose to Iran alternative methods to acquire that sense of greatness,
      Iran would forsake the nuclear road.

      If Iran were offered trains and oil refineries and a place of honor in regional trade, it would consider this seriously.


      A month later, in an interview with al-Monitor‘s Laura Rozen just before the U.S. presidential election,
      Halevy defended President Obama’s willingness to negotiate with Iran as ” very courageous.”


      Pasted from <http://2164th.blogspot.com/2013/11/the-brutal-truth-our-president-got-his.html?showComment=1385263221963#c2669905476206837535


      bob

      Delete
  9. The Hindu book of The Great Burrito is indeed a war poem but one must remember this is dealing with Chakra Three in its degraded outward looking stance where the objective is overcoming the other and not in its more proper human sense of overcoming oneself, as in, say, going to medical school and becoming a master of that subject or in going to Max Planck and working for the prevention and amelioration of blindness; and we have not yet even risen to the next level where the spiritual life itself truly begins, the sound being heard for the first time of no two things striking together.

    The Maha Burrito has the wonderful practical philosophy for that level of the big fish eat the little fish, and the little fish best be smart and quick.

    But the again, the lightning doesn't hit that level.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. But then again.....

      See: Navajo Pollen Path Sand Painting; Egyptian Wall Painting, etc that I have posted.

      Delete
    2. As for Christianity and violence, it is difficult to find much warrant for it in the reported words of Jesus in the Gospels.

      Revelations is an altogether different matter, unreflective of the Jesus of the Gospels.

      Delete

    3. Jesus had nothing to do with "Christianity", that may be part of the 'explanation'.


      bob

      Delete
  10. "There was only one Christian, and he died on the cross."

    Nietzsche

    Which is as much non sense as the statement above by bob.

    Which "Christianity", bob?

    The earliest traditions? Rome? Constantinople? Memphis? Hollywood? Salt Lake City?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies

    1. Exactly, "Christianity" is an amorphous term, just like "Judaism" and "Islam".


      bob

      Delete

    2. Primitive Middle Eastern religions (and most others) are much the same – Islam, Christianity and Judaism all define themselves through disgust for women's bodies.

      Delete
    3. Well Polly want a cracker?

      I guess Polly knows as much as a parrot...

      Israel is...

      Choke on it...

      Delete
    4. Polly, honey, this does not seem true of the 'primitive' hunter/gather/fisher religions in the Americas.

      And Jesus, who was Jewish through and through, doesn't seem disgusted with women's bodies. He hung out with enough of them. Was very conversational with them.

      In today's world it is only Islam that shows any great concern over women's bodies. And it is all faux concern.

      Mostly the men in Islam like to order them around. Make them march to their tune. I don't discern this tendency in Jews or Christians today. A little chastity might be preached, but then again there is no stoning.......

      Delete

    5. Sex-selective abortion - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

      The reason for intensifying sex-selection abortion in China and India can be seen through history and cultural background.



      bob

      Delete

    6. Vered Lee Mon Dec 16, 11:34:00 AM EST

      Age of child prostitutes in Israel dropping, report finds

      Knesset study cites cases of 11-year-olds used for commercial sex that are among the several thousands of teenagers involved in prostitution.
      By Vered Lee

      http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/.premium-1.542420

      "Spengler's Laws": "When a nation is reduced to selling its women, it's lost."
      hat tip: allen


      bob

      Delete
    7. The reason for the lack of, until now at least, sex-selection abortion in the USA can be seen through history and cultural background.

      What the F is you point, bob?

      Delete

    8. “You ask, what is our aim?
      I can answer in one word.

      It is victory, victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory!
      However long and hard the road may be; for without victory, there is no survival.”

      Delete
    9. When folks get married in China, the guys parents are taken care of by the kids.

      The Girls parents are shit outta luck.

      That's why the Chi-Coms are better than us.

      Delete
  11. An old formula, bob, is that the proclaimer became the Proclaimed. If this formula holds some truth, then the Proclaimed must contain some reflection of the proclaimer, so the idea runs.

    ReplyDelete
  12. At least 42 people, including children, were killed on Sunday when Syrian army helicopters dropped improvised "barrel bombs" in the northern province of Aleppo, a monitoring group said.

    ...

    "They hit a convoy of cars on a road in Hanano, many cars were destroyed. There were civilians there," said the Observatory's Rami Abdelrahman.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Finally, each new citizen was called up to receive their certificate, to shake hands with the 10 earnest officials, all of whom looked everyone in the eye and said "well done" or "good job", and to receive a small American flag from a representative of the Daughters of the American Revolution. Clutching these cheap flags and our precious certificates of naturalization we filed back to our seats, or fled the room.

    In the corridor was a table with small plastic cups of what appeared to be urine, but was more likely apple juice, and a cardboard display of American symbols and the flags of many other countries. This seemed to be intended as a backdrop for photographs of the happy new US citizens, although it would have been more appropriate for a grade school educational presentation.

    Any sentiment I might have had about finally being a citizen, with the right to vote, access to benefits, and the ability to cross the border without suspicion, had been vapourised by the condescending tone of the whole event. My partner and I left the courthouse as fast as we could without arousing the suspicion that we had set a time bomb, and set off for the nearest bar.


    American Citizen

    ReplyDelete
  14. Sam I will try to remember to post a link for the Seahawks next game before next Sunday.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Thanks (I think). I followed play-by-play on seahawks.com. What a disaster.

    ReplyDelete



  16. .
    WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama's healthcare law could have a "meltdown" and make it difficult for his Democratic Party to keep control of the U.S. Senate next year if ongoing problems with the program are not resolved, a Democratic senator said on Sunday.

    Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, who has urged delaying a penalty for people who do not enroll for health insurance in 2014 under the law, told CNN that a transitional year was needed for the complex healthcare program, commonly known as Obamacare, to work.

    "If it's so much more expensive than what we anticipated and if the coverage is not as good as what we had, you've got a complete meltdown at that time," Manchin told CNN's "State of the Union" program.

    "It falls of its own weight, if basically the cost becomes more than we can absorb, absolutely."

    The White House has been scrambling for months to control the damage from the botched October 1 launch of the law, formally called the Affordable Care Act, which aimed at making sure that millions of Americans without health insurance are able to receive medical coverage.

    There have been complaints from consumers about higher premiums than they previously had to pay for health insurance after their old plans were canceled because of new standards under the law, as well as lingering problems with the main web portal used to sign up for insurance, HealthCare.gov.

    Manchin said Senate Democrats who are up for re-election next year are "feeling the weight" of the program's woes and could have trouble keeping their majority in the chamber.

    Republicans have been highlighting the healthcare law's difficulties as they seek to gain the six seats they would need to win control of the 100-member Senate.

    "It needs to turn around," Manchin said of Obamacare. "I'm not going to say that I think we will lose it (the Senate). It's going to be extremely challenging. We have some very good people who are truly there, I believe, for the right reason. They're going to be challenged for the wrong reason."

    Obama acknowledged on Friday that that the bungled launch of the healthcare law was his biggest mistake of 2013. His public approval numbers have dropped to historic lows over the law's debut.

    The president said more than 1 million people have signed up so far for new coverage under Obamacare through HealthCare.gov, which services 36 states, and 14 state-run marketplaces.

    A day earlier, Obama's administration said people whose insurance plans were canceled because of the law may claim a "hardship exemption" to the requirement that all Americans must have coverage by March 31 next year or face a penalty.

    Manchin, a conservative Democrat whose state of West Virginia has been increasingly trending Republican, has made no secret of his frustration over the program's fits and starts.

    Last month he introduced legislation to delay by a year the $95 penalty for failing to sign up for health insurance, saying Americans should not be penalized while Obamacare is going through its "transition period."

    Manchin does not face re-election next year, but some Democrats who do have also urged changes to the program, such as extending the open enrollment period beyond the March 31 deadline. One third of the Senate is re-elected every two years.

    (Reporting By Susan Cornwell; editing by Christopher Wilson

    ReplyDelete
  17. This year I was on holiday in Corsica and happened to wander into the church of a tiny hamlet in the hills where I found a memorial to the dead from World War I. Out of a population that can have been no more than 150, eight young men, bearing among them only three last names, had died in that conflict.

    ...

    The era just before World War I, with its gas lighting and its horse-drawn carriages, seems very far off and quaint, it is similar in many ways—often unsettlingly so—to ours, as a look below the surface reveals. The decades leading up to 1914 were, like our own time, a period of dramatic shifts and upheavals, which those who experienced them thought of as unprecedented in speed and scale.

    ...

    We are witnessing, as much as the world of 1914, shifts in the international power structure, with emerging powers challenging the established ones. Just as national rivalries led to mutual suspicions between Britain and the newly ascendant Germany before 1914, the same is happening between the U.S. and China now, and also between China and Japan.


    Rhyme Of History

    ReplyDelete

  18. “And, with much of Europe occupied by Nazi Germany,
    and Mussolini's armies in Albania, on the Greek frontier,
    one wasn't sure what came next. So, don't trust the telephone.

    Or the newspapers. Or the radio. Or tomorrow.”

    ― Alan Furst, Spies of the Balkans


    bob

    ReplyDelete
  19. Approx. 8.4 Million Americans now have health coverage as a result of Obamacare.

    Deal's done, folks.

    ACA Signups

    ReplyDelete